Posted
by
timothy
on Saturday May 18, 2013 @08:28AM
from the top-5-answers-on-the-board dept.

An anonymous reader writes "In results that may signal some discomfort with the enormous DIY promise of 3D printing and similar home-manufacturing technologies, a new Reason-Rupe poll finds that an otherwise gun control-weary American public thinks owners of 3D printers ought not be allowed to make their own guns or gun parts. Of course, implementing such a restrictive policy might be tad more difficult than measuring popular preferences." This poll is of only 1000 people, though; your mileage may vary.

If you're one of the 38% who didn't support the ban, the IRS and ATF would like to contact you to request your clarification of your position. Be prepared to submit copies of your Twitter and Facebook postings.

No, actually, they don't give a shit. I could make myself a firearm, RIGHT NOW, and they're OK with that (so long as it doesn't infringe on certain things, like bore diameter, barrel length if it's a shotgun or pistol.. stuff you can own, but need some licenses (tax stamps) from the ATF to own).

For the price of a single 3D printer you could slam out dozens of zip guns. Don't even need any serious machining tools for that.

The whole 3D printed gun scare is just that. A scare. It's headlines. That is all.

So the poll really reveals that most people are ignorant of the facts, and would happily remain ignorant while voting to take rights away. Though if asked directly "would you educate yourself on all the facts before voting" most would say "yes," but wouldn't actually do it. Or they would consider reading their favorite completely one-sided blog as "education."

It is also commonly known that having a baby causes huge neurological changes in both parents, which in turn changes their political values. Ostensibly they are more willing to sacrifice freedom (theirs and everyone else's) for promises of security (theirs, that's all they care about). Based on my experience, the changes are a bit deeper than that: it makes them lose their ability to think critically, to see the big picture, and to be smart.

I believe otherwise. I think the ATF does care if people make their own firearms because a large portion of the people that make up the ATF do not believe that anyone but themselves are responsible enough to own firearms.

Someone that makes a firearm at home might be doing so completely within the law but it appears to me that the ATF does not like this because they would have no record of it. If they don't have a record of it then they can't take it from us when they wish. That's just the way they think, it's a culture that exists within the ATF since it was created.

Of course certain individual ATF agents may not have a problem with responsible firearm ownership, manufacture, or transfer but the people in charge certainly do. There are all kinds of examples of people having their weapons taken from them and never returned, despite it being quite illegal for the ATF to do so. People have ended up dead because the ATF didn't have the right paperwork and they thought someone had an "illegal" gun.

The ATF has to be very nervous right now over 3D printing. Now it no longer takes expensive machine tools and a certain level of skill to mass produce firearms. Now all it takes is a computer, 3D printer, plastic, and the ability to stack up Lego blocks.

If the ATF cannot find a way to regulate this then they are going to find themselves irrelevant, and out of a job.

What a load of bullshit. The government isn't supposed to fear us, you twit, and to be brutally honest, it's that attitude that has gotten us into such the mess we're in today. After all, how far a leap is it from "government is supposed to fear us" to "if only someone would bomb a federal building in Oklahoma City or an Olympic venue in Atlanta, that would show 'em"?

The government is supposed to provide for the common defense and general welfare of the country. When some dictator stages a military coup d'état against his government, how well is that government able to provide for the common defense and general welfare? It's impossible for a government that fears its citizenry to fulfill that mandate. It's also utterly moronic to espouse rule by physical intimidation, which is exactly what you're supporting when you propagate this idiotic notion that people should have guns to keep government in check.

A little anecdote I like to relate to "government is supposed to fear us" twits:

On April 12, 2009, three Navy SEALs shot and killed three Somali pirates holding Captain Richard Phillips of the Maersk Alabama hostage. They had parachuted in two days before, and were set up on the fantail of the U.S.S. Bainbridge, a destroyer dispatched to handle the situation. The pirates were on a lifeboat being towed over 75 feet behind the Bainbridge. The SEALs had been manning their sniper rifles for over 24 hours straight, and both boats were bobbing up and down. Three simultaneous shots were taken, and there were three direct hits in the heads of each of the pirates. Captain Phillips was successfully rescued without injury.

I bring this up for a couple of reasons. First, because Navy SEALs are badass, and you do not want to mess with them. But mostly because you need to understand that if the government wants you dead, you are going to be dead. You will be a red splatter on the wall before you even have the chance to get your military-grade weaponry.

Several times since the Revolutionary War, nutcases have tried to rise up in armed resistance to the U.S. government. The largest such rebellion took place between 1861 and 1865. You would have thought that that would have settled the matter once and for all, but no, even almost 150 years later, we still have people romanticizing revolutions trying to convince others that overthrowing the U.S. government via armed conflict is a good idea, or that the U.S. government is even remotely concerned about the possibility; thus we end up with incidents like Ruby Ridge and Waco. So let me break it down to you really simple-like: 1) Armed revolt against the U.S. government by U.S. citizens will never work, and 2) if you try, you will be quickly dispatched with no matter how many guns you own.

And personally, I'm glad. Unlike apparently you, I realize that we need government to maintain our society. If someone burns down my house or murders someone in my family, I don't want the government to be afraid to arrest and prosecute the guy who did it because he has a lot of guns, that's the height of idiocy. If you want a haven where there is little to no government interference, you should move to Somalia. There's practically no government there past the "might makes right" rules imposed by local warlords. If you have a lot of guns, you have a lot of power. If someone commits some perceived injustice against you, there's nothing stopping you from using your resources to carry out justice in whatever way you want. As an added bonus, you wouldn't have to pay taxes. Of course, you do have to worry about your warlord neighbors getting jealous of your stuff and, if they have more guns and mercenaries than you do, coming over and taking it. But hey, at least you can go down in a blaze of glory knowing that you and your family are dying without the benefit of government helping you with your personal protection or interfering with your ability to acquire lots of guns and that the only limit you have on what kind you can buy is how much money you have.

I'm not a right-wing "US government is conspiring with UN to set up concentration camps" nutcase, but the amount of incorrect claims in your post is so staggering that I have to play the devil's advocate here.

What a load of bullshit. The government isn't supposed to fear us, you twit

A democratic government of free people is not supposed to fear those people, you're right. However, is that governments can sometimes devolve from democracy into a populist tyranny of the majority, and ultimately into a dictatorship. Nazi Germany was an extreme example of that; more mild recent ones are Russia and Venezuela. The point is that any people in the government who have similar notions should be fearful of an armed and vigilant populace.

Several times since the Revolutionary War, nutcases have tried to rise up in armed resistance to the U.S. government. The largest such rebellion took place between 1861 and 1865.

So Civil War was just a bunch of nutcases rising up in armed resistance against U.S. government, really? And not, say, duly elected governments of several states, which at that time considered themselves sovereign, seceding and establishing their own government?

Regardless of the unsavory causes for the sake of which CSA was established, it is as far from what you're trying to portray here as can possibly be. It was an example of two professional, state-funded and state-controlled armies hashing it out in the field, not unorganized militia.

. If someone burns down my house or murders someone in my family, I don't want the government to be afraid to arrest and prosecute the guy who did it

Hypothetically speaking, what if the government burns down your house and murders someone in your family?

TL;DR version: your entire argument hinges on the notion that government is always beneficial. This is provably not the case: USSR, Nazi Germany, DPRK are all examples of extremely oppressive governments. There are also numerous examples of benign governments which devolved into oppressive ones, either through abuse of populism in times of crisis, or through an internal coup d'etat. The "security of a free state" argument is about preventing that from happening, not about resisting a legitimate democratic government.

You mean where homicides have fallen by over 50% in twenty years and all other crimes are down by 50% over the same time period? That "violence rate"? Even the most anti-gun news groups have been forced to admit that the whole "we have a violence epidemic!" headline is a load of bullshit. Just read the news from the past week or two and you'll see almost every news group running a story about government reports showing how much crime has fallen in the US.

Did you see what you did there? Is "gun violence" somehow more criminal, cruel, or notable than any other kind of violence?

Fact is that total violent crimes hit a new low, I recall it's the lowest it has been in something like 50 or 60 years. I don't know what the "gun violence" rate is and I don't care to look it up. I don't care because I know that "gun violence" statistics are loaded with inaccuracies by people with an agenda to deny law abiding people of their right of self defense.

While violent crimes have hit a new low we've seen gun ownership hit new highs. The "gun violence" rates may have gone up but that is only because "gun violence" as defined by people like the Brady Campaign include suicides, self defense shootings, police interventions, and accidents. I would not consider the killing of a home invader by the home owner to be "gun violence" but Brady Campaign does. In most jurisdictions this is not even considered a crime. As someone smarter than me has said, "There are four types of homicide, felonious, excusable, justifiable, and praiseworthy."

Even if "gun violence" is high I am not so sure that is a bad thing. If someone breaks into the home of another they should expect some "gun violence" from the home owner in return. That would be something praiseworthy.

Did you see what you missed there? Gun violence is 'down'. However, so is gun ownership, so your point is moot. And of course that we're still wildly ahead of other civilized countries in deaths per capita by guns. Maybe people would use other weapons, heck even likely, but a knife can't kill as many people as quickly or as surely as a gun. And a 5 year old is going to be hard pressed to kill an adult with a knife.

I would not consider the killing of a home invader by the home owner to be "gun violence" but Brady Campaign does.

No they don't. Source?

Even if "gun violence" is high I am not so sure that is a bad thing.

Just wow. violence is a 'good' thing?

If someone breaks into the home of another they should expect some "gun violence" from the home owner in return. That would be something praiseworthy.

The current "zip gun" design is simply a proof of concept, proving that you can in fact CTRL+P a working, untraceable, undetectable firearm.

It's not dissimilar to the 3d printed large capacity magazines created before it. Although they're already much more practical: A 30 round clip that's cheap/easy enough to simply be thrown away after 1 use doesn't need to reliably fire more then 30 rounds to be fully effective.

The point however, is that it's a zip-gun today...it's a fully working AR-15 or Glock 17 tomorrow, or even a full on mini-gun, or printed caseless ammo. And "tomorrow" isn't a euphemism for "some day far in the future, maybe, but probably not". No, "tomorrow" really is tomorrow. Between advancements in 3D printer tech, advancements in materials, advancements in software, and a whole bunch of people suddenly becoming interested in and buying their own 3D printers...we'll be far, far past "zip-gun" this time next year.

Wake the fuck up. This really does change everything. This bell cannot be unrung. No matter where you sit politically on issues of guns, this is the new reality and any regulations you care to write can't pretend reality is something else if you want them to have any real effect.

Want to ban 30 round clips so bad guys can't fire so many rounds at once as they're marching through an elementrary school? Or ban assault weapons? Or ban silencers? Or require background checks?

Noble intentions, but how's that going to be effective when 3D printers are as common place and easy to use as ink jet photo printers are today?

Except for the fact that the NRA gets very little money from gun manufacturers. Where they get their money from is millions of Americans writing checks so that the NRA will represent them in Washington.

Except for the fact that the NRA gets very little money from gun manufacturers. Where they get their money from is mostly from advertising revenues from firearms companies, donations to it's Ring of Freedom corporate sponsors program from firearms companies, donations to its 501(c)3 and 501(c)4 organizations (again largely from firearms companies. The membership dues cover less than half of their budget, and even some of those are paid for by firearms companies: Taurus buys a membership for each customer.

Exactly. 29% of people are just idiots. Who cares what they think about 'hot button topics' when they show this level of stupidity.
Ladders! We should ban ladders, that's where many accidents at home come from!/s

Well, according to TFA, 29% of people surveyed didn't think people should be allowed to own 3D printers at all!

There are way too many luddites out there.

It's hardly surprising though. The kind of people who are so concerned with what you may own, vice what you do with it, also tend to be kind of people who would want to regulate everything else about what you own and don't own. The overlap is hardly surprising.

Yes, unfortunately the summary is not very clear about this; a percentage said that "yes we should be able to have 3D printers" and of that group they asked the relevant question about firearms. So not even the full 1,003 got to answer that question at all. It is indeed a shame though that there's a percentage that doesn't believe in the enabling power of technology. Basement/garage inventors are a cornerstone of innovation - people that haven't been told what "can't be done".

Our prisons are a pretty good demonstration of why attempt to ban the means of making weapons is pretty pointless. It's rather insane actually. We live in a free society with a great degree of technological sophistication.

The tools that should be available in any high school should be sufficient to make whatever weapons you want.

You're allowed to build homemade guns in the US under the condition that the gun itself would be legal to own anyway (for example, it isn't fully automatic). 3D printers just make it a bit more accessible than crafting it by hand. Apparently, many people in the US just don't know this fact.

When I studied statistics and polling, I learned that a sample of 1,000 gave you answers that were reliable to a confidence interval of 1%. The Gallup poll and other polls use a nationwide sample of about 1,000.

There's no benefit to using more than 1,000 because they'd have to poll very large numbers of people for very small and meaningless improvements in the confidence interval. It doesn't make any difference whether 53%, 53.2% or 52.9% of Americans oppose printing guns at home.

Politicians don't say, "Well, I wouldn't worry about this if 52% of those polled opposed it, but now that 53% oppose it we have to do something about it."

Well market research isn't political polling but we always used sample sizes much larger. For a much smaller topic. Maybe 1000 is ok, but is it 1000 registered democrats? Unless it can be certain that there is a good cross section, then how can we know.

We made very sure of the sample sizes as well as the type of person we were interviewing. What is their background, experience with the products, things like that.

Whether or not I agree with the results isn't important. What is important is that

My statistics books are packed away, but I learned that if you have a binary, yes-no question, and a universe of 3 million people, a sample of about 1,000 responses will predict the belief of the 3 million people to an accuracy of 1% with a confidence of 95%.

If you want to get the responses of subgroups, i.e., how many women, how many black people, how many people aged 20-29, 30-39, 40-49, etc., how many people in different income categories (as market researchers often do), then you'd have to use a larger

Yeah, I know, I hate all those pointed stick killing massacres we've experienced lately. Or all the accidental oops my 6-year old killed her brother with a pointed stick episodes.

Tell that to the 8 year old little girl who was stabbed to death by her 12 year old brother in April. Bare minimum you might point poke someone's eye out. Pointy stick are dangerous and must be registered.

Yes, that was one girl, and just because some people manage anyways, does not imply that firearms don't make it easier and lead to deaths that might otherwise not happen. A firearm is an extremely easy way of killing people you might not already be capable of killing. With a firearm, that same 8 year old girl could have killed the 12 year old brother which would have been substantially less likely were she only to have had access to pointy sticks.

Posts like yours really reinforce the idea that perhaps the people with firearms are precisely the people that shouldn't be allowed anywhere near them. Because critical reasoning is an essential firearm handling skill.

Whatever happened to the concept of Personal Responsibility? Of being held accountable for your own actions, instead of the knee-jerk reaction of "it's the firearms fault, ban them everywhere we can." This mass punishment, this taking away of people's ability to use their time and money as they see fit, is crazy. If someone proves that they can't handle a level of responsibility, then I can understand rights being taken away, but to punish everything, to take away abilities from everyone? I find it insulting, that I am automatically assumed to not be responsible off the bat.

The problem with printed firearms is that they're plastic. We have no means to detect them. They instantly obsolete our security infrastructure. You can walk onto an airplane with one. You could walk into a courtroom with one. You could walk into the White House, Congress, or the Supreme Court with one. That is a major problem.

Sure, these plastic firearms could have been made previously. However up until now, the people with the means to make such a weapon were smart enough to not make such a weapon give

OK. So we have a world where people can sneak around with.22 caliber one shot pistols that are not visible to metal detectors. I mean, everyone will want one, no? This changes the entire security dynamic, no?

Lions and tigers and bears. Oh. My.

Plastic gun printing changes absolutely nothing. The current stamping and seizing about this is simply panem et circenses.

You are suggesting thar all weapons are the same. Most people see a difference between guns, knives and bare hands. I imagine even you would he in favour of restricting a hypothetical atomic bomb printer.

The fact the people do have to stab each other with sharpened toothbrushes suggests that the prison ban on guns is realistic, sensible and effective.

The problem with printed firearms is that they're plastic. We have no means to detect them. They instantly obsolete our security infrastructure. You can walk onto an airplane with one. You could walk into a courtroom with one. You could walk into the White House, Congress, or the Supreme Court with one. That is a major problem.

And banning them will do exactly nothing to address that problem.

A person who would make a gun with the intention of committing murder with it isn't likely to be deterred by a law banning his gun. Actually, that law already exists... the Defense Distributed guy was careful to epoxy a six ounce block of metal to his before fully assembling it into an operable gun, because it's a federal felony to manufacture an undetectable gun.

First of all - we already have military-grade polymer firearms that are "detectable" by modern scanning technology.

Second - a plastic "printable" firearm is pretty worthless without ammunition. This would be the doomsday scenario you describe when they manage to make a plastic bullet, and a plastic casing, that won't fragment/explode in the firearm when the primer ignites the powder.

Finally - if instead of banning firearms from those places, we allowed those with the mea

Nobody is trying to say if you print a gun and use it, it's the gun's fault. The blame still falls wholly on the person who committed the crime. What you don't seem to understand is that laws are meant to keep people safe and secure, not just punish people after the fact. Nobody needs to prove they can't handle drinking and driving to be told not to do it, there's no reason to wait until people get hurt to stop something. Treating rules and regulations as an attack on your person is just being childish. As

The problem with personal responsibility is that there are a lot of people around with a friend or relative who was killed by a asshole with a gun.

They've decided that if you want to stop other people from being killed by assholes with guns, it's not effective to stop people from being assholes. They've decided that it is effective to stop assholes from getting guns. And the only way to stop assholes from getting guns is make it more difficult for everyone from getting guns.

but when you weigh that against the 40,000 or so gun deaths every year, it's not worth it.

First off, about 30,000 of those are suicides. Studies have repeatedly shown that gun ownership has no impact on suicide rates. Secondly, the US has roughly 315 MILLION people in it. About 3.5 times as many people die in car accidents in the US each year as are killed with a gun (that even includes self-defense shootings in that number).

You have to be really into guns to think it's worthwhile to have a friend die in order to have your guns, and most people aren't really into guns that much.

You have to be really immature to think your emotions invalidate peoples right to self-defense. Even the most anti-gun groups have admitted that there are (low end) 10 t

The age varies but even pre-teens can have access to firearms legally in most States and Teenagers can legally own them. Hell in a lot of states 18 year olds can get concealed weapon permits. So what exactly is your point again?

Yet another Brit puts his two pence in. Guess what? You guys are the reason we have the Second Amendment.

Do you mean because our second amendment is derived from their own bill of rights? Most people forget that this country was largely made up of Englishmen, and many of our ideas are based on ones that existed already, and this is one of them. The right to bear arms was considered a natural right, not even a written law until after a King had attempted to disarm his subjects. And now, even though the right to bear arms is also made clear in their bill of rights, firearms are still heavily regulated in England

The constitution already defines what the Federal Government can do and banning plastic guns is not in that list.
Of course the US government ignores the constitution (with or without a popular vote) so there is some truth to what you say.

Letting people have guns without being part of a well-trained militia is also not on the things the Federal Government can do, but here we are.

Words change meaning over time. "Well regulated" means "well armed, provisioned", not well-trained, and "militia" means "ordinary citizens acting as makeshift military", not a formal military unit. And technically, "letting people do X" is not an action; the federal government has its roles rigidly defined, and "restricting citizens from owning armaments" is not one of those roles.

(a) The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age and, except as provided in section 313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who are, or who have made a declaration of intention to become, citizens of the United States and of female citizens of the United States who are members of the National Guard.

And after 9/11, you could probably have gotten the same results for warrantless wiretapping, indefinite detention, etc. This is why we have a republic, not a democracy. The rightness of a public policy is not measured by popular support. The only real reason to go by what is popular is that if you constantly ignore the popular will on things that are neutral or right, you risk delegitimizing the government.

Guys and gals, we made zip guns in Jr. high shop in the 1950s. They might not have been very accurate, but guns they were, and shoot they did. Any attempt to keep people from building and owning guns is a waste of time and money.
We do have the right, not priviledge, to keep and bear arms. Just how many tax dollars are we going to spend to deny rights?

I think the whole point of developing a technique to print a working gun in the first place was not specifically to make a weapon, but rather was to demonstrate that the ever increasing rate of technological development and scientific discovery is launching humanity headlong into a realm where we will have to address questions that we as a species are not prepared to answer.

Barely a majority, 52%? Isn't there something in the founding fathers statements regarding "tyranny of the majority" and hence the reason for the Constitution/Bill of Rights? Any technology can be used for good or evil, people are often killed with wine bottles (a 200 year old technology) yet we don't see a mass effort to redesign/restrict them for "safety". As always the focus should be on the INDIVIDUAL committing the act of violence, not the piece of hardware they choose to commit it with.

A Grizzly gunsmith lathe and mill combo costs around $4000, less than a 3d printer. The steel and aluminum rods and blocks are also cheap and available. Anyone can machine a REAL gun cheaper than they can make a plastic one. You make bullets out of lead/tin tire rim weights. If you use an older cartridge that was originally a block powder round like.45 colt or 45-70 govt. you can make your own powder. The only part that I'm not sure of is how one would make brass shell cases or primers.

Q.E.D. Most Americans (hell, most people anywhere) lack any sort of philosophy or reality-based worldview of their own and are forced to turn to mainstream media (which is all too eager to hand out their convenient, pre-packaged version with super-sticky adhesive backing).

To quote James Bovard (sorry, folks; this one doesn't get credited to ole' Ben Franklin after all):

"Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to eat for dinner. Liberty is a well-armed sheep contesting the vote."

Perhaps it's worth noting that, when the Second Amendment was instituted, gunsmithing and the manufacture of firearms was a cottage industry. On the flip side, it's probably fair to say the founders were most interested in the protection of long arms, not handguns. The pistol was developed for the sole purpose of the destruction of human life; not so with long arms, though initial development mainly concentrated on that purpose. .

1. Most polls are only of around 1000 people are so, they are done statisticly to reflect the demographic they are meant to represent.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sampling_%28statistics%29#Sampling_methods

2. Speaking of 1, given the poll was done by "reason.com" themselves, i want to know the sampling method used and its error rate.

3. the results of the poll where 53-44, so the reality is public opinions are really "mixed".

if your survey includes mostly people who do those things you'll get different answers but this survey was almost entirely of people who don't print 3D guns.I wouldn't be surprised if surveys found that 53% of the population said any of these if the survey is mostly of people who don't do them

I know the gun thing is the big boogieman now in regards to 3-D printers, but I can't help but think there's more mundane things that a 3-D printer can do that the powers-that-be are afraid of. It sure would be nice to print out a new head light bezel for my truck for ten bucks instead of paying over $200 from the dealership.

Printers are sold with an embedded chip that prevents the printing of currency. From what I understand, the chip is typically buried so deep into the printer that they simply can't operate if you could find it and remove it. We could attempt a similar requirement on a 3D printer.

However, gun parts can vary wildly. And, a part for a gun could conceivably be used as a part for a completely different, legal machine. I don't see a practical means of programming such a limitation.

Printers are sold with an embedded chip that prevents the printing of currency. From what I understand, the chip is typically buried so deep into the printer that they simply can't operate if you could find it and remove it. We could attempt a similar requirement on a 3D printer.

I don't think that is even remotely technically feasible. The govs of the world avoid currency duping by making their paper currency designs very specific and difficult to replicate. cotton paper, the internalized vertical stripe, under a magnifing glass there is no dot pattern visible.

it is even less technically feasible to do with 3d printers for a few reasonsa) a rediculously large library of illegal shapes would need to be made. sold with every printer, this also won't work because slight deviations

There's no such thing as an AK-47 permit in Texas or elsewhere in the US, assuming you're referring to the semi-auto variant.

Assuming that one is not otherwise prohibited from possessing firearms (e.g. not a criminal), it's perfectly legal to make any otherwise-legal firearm for personal use in the US. For example, if one wished to build a semi-auto AK-47, that's fine (here's a guy making one from a shovel he bent into the appropriate shape [northeastshooters.com], while here are the stamped/punched flats [ak-builder.com] that you'd need to bend, drill, and heat-treat to make your own semi-auto AK receiver, the only regulated part). If you wanted to build a full-auto one, that's forbidden. You can make silencers, short-barreled rifles/shotguns, etc., but ONLY after getting the appropriate tax stamp from the ATF.

Right, it would be interesting to ask people whether they feel the same way about making guns in a machine shop, or making bullets in a machine shop. I bet the answer changes.

The answer to your question about regulation is that if you're making it for your own use, it's probably legal. The law is carefully worded so that a complete kit wouldn't be legal, but otherwise it's kind of what you'd expect the NRA to support.

Actually if you have a woodworking shop you have everything you need to make a submachine gun that would make this "printed" hand exploder look like the toy it is. I am not saying it would be easy nor look good when you were done. It would however be full auto/select fire and hold as many rounds as you want (and be able to slap in more quickly). Metalworking is easy, fine metalworking, like fine woodworking is hard.

It shouldn't be that hard to have a 3d printer determine if it is making something with a hole the size of a standard bullet. For example, is it drawing a circle that's 9mm or one of the other common sizes. If it were to make the hole say 9.2 mm all the gasses that should be propelling the bullet would escape on the sides.

actually right now it is pretty hard and would kill cheap home printers to some extent. because they would need to be made unmodifiable.also there's many sized bullets so..

however, it's pretty stupid to even ask the question since the _real_ question to ask should be "should americans be allowed to make guns at home?" because that's perfectly legal.

the bullet gets some good momentum even if it's just the casing acting as the barrel. in the case of the liberator that's pretty much what happens anyways..

Wasting mod points to post, but:
US Americans are not that heterogenous. What specific groups (with dissenting views relevant to the matter at hand) are systematically excluded from the sample?

They offer up their sampling procedures and methodology here [reason.com].

A larger sample size is not inherently better. 1000 isn't much different from 10,000 or 10 million. If the sampling method would be unrepresentative with 1000 cases, it wouldn't be any better with more.

Are you kidding me? You can't get from county to county, let alone state to state with any hope of finding a uniformity between them that could be construed as an average. You couldn't poll 1000 homeowners out of 750000 in a city over taxes and have it work. This is the equivalent of closing your eyes and tossing a dart over your shoulder to win the teddy bear.

Just because they offer up their cockamamie methodology, doesn't make it any the less; smoke pumped up your butt.

Here [tinyurl.com] is a totally hacked-together and very poorly written JS implementation. It'll constantly take 1000-sample surveys of a 315m population. The actual distribution of the population is printed at the top, and the results of the surveys are printed underneath, color-coded to make it easier to spot the results.

It's kinda slow and may well need a 64-bit browser, so I also made versions with 100m population size [tinyurl.com], 31.5m [tinyurl.com] and 3.15m [tinyurl.com]. If you're going to argue that those are too sm

considering that out of the 1000 people 75% probably didn't hear about 3D printers before the news talked about 3D printed guns then yea there is a sample bias.

3D printers are a niche. they aren't talked about very often. Most people don't realize that you can upload a design and have a computer build a plastic model of something in an hour. Even things like CNC machines and laser cutters in the minds of average citizens are more hollywoodized than reality.

My grandfather, a WWII vet and a hunter, held me upright and helped me to shoot his 12 ga. when I was four years old. It's not a hobby for some of us; it's a tool and a normal aspect of everyday life. From that age, I learned to respect firearms. As a child, I never so much as touched a gun without permission in part because I knew what they could do and I knew I could shoot them with supervision. Contrast this certain of my peers from the suburbs, who would not be allowed to use guns until they were much o